Crispin Hull

The electorate of Kalgoorlie in Western Australia is one of the largest in the world _ if not the largest. As well as the mining centre of Kalgoorlie it contains huge almost empty areas of desert and salt-lake country that go for kilometre after kilometre. A man could go mad in such country.

The electorate is held for Labor by the outspoken Graeme Campbell. Mr Campbell has made many statements in the past contrary to the prevailing views of the party. He has variously attacked immigration, multi-culturalism, aspects of Aboriginal land rights, the High Court, the move to a republic and proposals for an anti-racial-vilification law. He also offends party orthodoxy in refusing to ask Dorothy Dixers in parliamentary Question Time, preferring to asking testing questions of government ministers.

In short he is a pest to party disciplinarians. But he holds the seat of Kalgoorlie by a reasonably healthy margin. Worse, from the perspective of party disciplinarians, he holds the seat precisely because of his outspoken views, not despite them. His opponents within the party acknowledge that he attracts a red-neck or working-class-Tory vote that would otherwise go to the National Party. It means that to expel him from the party or to give pre-selection to someone else would result in the likely loss of the seat in an election where every Labor seat is likely to be very precious to the party.
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Amid the hype over the battle for the presidency of the Liberal Party in Western Australia, there is cause for concern. The contest has been described as a test for the leadership of the Leader of the Opposition, John Howard. Mr Howard has repeated many times that the organizational wing of the party is not subject to the parliamentary leadership and vice versa. He said before the weekend ballot that he would not back either contestant and he would work with whomever won. That may have been a sensible stand before the vote. It may not be afterwords.

The contest was between former senator Reg Withers and the incumbent Dr David Honey, widely seen as the protege of Senator Noel Crichton-Browne whose forces have attempted (with some success) to install candidates with right-wing views as Liberal candidates in Western Australia.
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The former director of the Australian War Memorial, Brendan Kelson, and the deputy director, Micahel McKernan, have been refused legal aid in their challenge over a report by the Merit Protection Review Agency.

The MPRA did a four-month inquiry at the memorial last year and presented it to Public Service Minister Gary Johns just before Christmas.
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The Federal Government has reversed its decision not to give the former director of the Australian War Memorial, Brendan Kelson, and the deputy director, Michael McKernan, legal aid in their challenge over a report by the Merit Protection Review Agency.

The MPRA did a four-month inquiry at the memorial last year and presented it to Public Service Minister Gary Johns just before Christmas.
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Izzy Asper’s Can West Global Communications appear to have rebutted assertions that they are in breach of Australian Broadcasting regulations after they and the Ten Network won a major legal victory over Charles Curran and his Capital Television Holdings.

Mr Curran failed this week to pursue a case he mounted in the NSW Supreme Court against Mr Asper’s Can West, Ten Network and others and agreed to them pay costs of about $1 million.

Mr Curran had sued asserting the defendants had conspired to deprive him and Capital Television Holdings from buying Northern Rivers Television last year. (Capital Television Holdings has no connection with the Canberra Capital station.)
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The Great Oxymoronic Confluence is more likely to be next year than this year. Several things have caused the postponement _ a skiing holiday and some resulting upper-leg pain, a new job with a later finishing time, the change of date of the oxymoron itself, and more pertinently the regrettably conflicting desires of wanting to be an athlete in the morning and a consumer of fine wine, food and good company in the evening.

What was the name of the dumb philosopher could not understand the distinction between the mind and body? The Great Oxymoronic Confluence is almost inevitable, but not this year.

It will occur when I run the 10 kilometres of The Canberra Times Fun Run in the same number of minutes as my age in years _ 44 by Fun Run day. It is an elegant equation, and I’m sure there is a quick physiology PhD in it for someone.
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Who’s Who is not going on CD and has no intention of doing so. Their bread and butter depends on it. The reason is privacy. Ego aside, people give their names to Who Who’s so other people can look them up. In the computer speak, the entry point into the database is the name, surname first.

If the book came out electronically, the commercially minded could extract sub-databases according to sports and other interests from the 10,000 top Australians. Thus a list of wine-lovers or golfers could be constructed and a very targeted mailing list constructed. Thus, Who’s Who, not wanting to offend its clientele, does not publish electronically.

Most electronic phonebook products do not allow reverse searching _ that is from address or number back to the person.
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Doctor organisations have responded predictably to the ACT Government’s plan to give a patients access to their records. They did not like it. Their fear is twofold: an avalanche of litigation and a feeling that patients could easily misinterpret their records, leading to unnecessary anxiety.

The ACT legislation is prospective; it will not apply to existing records. However, a case is before the High Court about the status of existing records. If that goes in favour of patients it will affect all previous records.

The avalanche of litigation is a misguided fear; patients have had access to public-hospital records for about a decade under freedom-of-information legislation in various states and territories. There has been no avalanche.
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I did not contribute much to Australia’s gross domestic product or gross domestic consumption on Saturday.

As days go _ according to the measures of economists _ I had a pretty miserable day. My standard of living was equivalent to _ well, not quite a Bangladeshi _ but certainly no higher than an Egyptian, Thai or Peruvian.

Let me add it up. One home-made salmon sandwich. The bought ingredients must have put 80 cents on the national account.
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It’s official _ lawyerisation continues apace. The legal profession is growing, getting richer and more male-dominated.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics put out a report last week on the legal-services industry showing a modest increase in employment of 14 per cent between June 1988 and June 1993 (against a five per cent increase in total Australian employment).

But the figure disguises an even greater increase in the number of practising lawyers and a large increase in their incomes.
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